Hylobates is one of the SME participants of the world’s biggest ever study of allergies known as the Integrated Approaches to Food Allergen and Allergy Risk Management (iFAAM) which officially got underway on 19 March. The €9million project spearheaded by the University of Manchester builds on an earlier €14.3 million research study and will involve the worlds leading experts in the UK, Europe, Australia and US. The parting point is the lack of evidence to either prevent food allergy developing or protect adequately those who are already allergic. The 38 partners iFAAM consortium will produce a standardised management process for food manufacturing companies and will also develop tools designed to enforce these regulations and produce evidence-based knowledge to inform new health advice on nutrition for pregnant women, babies and allergy sufferers.

Up to 20 million European citizens suffer from food allergy which may be triggered by a list of foods including milk, egg, peanuts, soya, wheat, tree nuts, mustard, lupin, fish, crustacean and molluscan shell fish and celery which have to be labelled irrespective of the level at which they are included in a recipe. However, management of food allergens that accidently find their way into foods which might otherwise be free of allergen, for example through the use of common processing equipment, remains problematic and often gives rise to precautionary “may contain” labels.

Professor Clare Mills, from the Allergy and Respiratory Centre of The University of Manchester’s Institute of Inflammation and Repair and based in the Manchester Institute of Biotechnology, will head the study. Professor Mills said: “This is a massive research project which will have far reaching consequences for consumers and food producers. The evidence base and tools that result from this will support more transparent precautionary “may contain” labelling of allergens in foods which will make life easier for allergy sufferers as they try to avoid problem foods.”

Sue Hattersley, Head of the UK Food Standard’s Agency’s Allergy Branch said: “We anticipate that the information learned through iFAAM will help determine a more consistent approach to providing consumers with information, so they can make safe choices about the food they eat. Furthermore it will provide a greater insight into the development of food allergies. From an industry and regulatory perspective, it is expected that the results of the project will provide more guidance on the management of food allergens.”

New risk models will be built on pre-existing clinical data sets to support management of these allergens in a factory environment to minimise the use of such labels. Luca Bucchini, manager director of iFAAM partner Hylobates Consulting which will contribute to contamination modelling and in disseminating risk analysis methods to food industry and SMEs, said: “Managing food allergens is still a challenge for many food businesses, particularly smaller SMEs. Better tools can benefit consumers with food allergies, including children.”

Other researchers will look at tools to measure allergens in food to allow validation and monitoring of allergen management plans. Other strands of the three year project will seek to predict who is likely to suffer a severe reaction, identify whether early introduction of allergenic foods and other nutritional factors may be protective against development of allergies later on in life.

Like this:

Bridging science and industry by knowledge transfer was the main topic of the 1st FAB-Industry-Forum & Food-Cluster Initiative Conference held last 11 and 12th of October in Brussels. The event organised by the CommNet network together with the Food Cluster Initiative brought together high-profile scientists, EU Commission, MEPs, Food Industry, SME associations and project coordinators to discuss the relevance and challenges for the knowledge and technology transfer from EU funded projects to stakeholders and consumers, and to strengthen the European bioeconomy and – industry. The effective, broad and stakeholder- specific communication of research projects results is also a moral obligation of FP7 Projects towards EU-taxpayers, explained CommNet´s Rhonda Smith during her welcoming and contribution on the Outlooks for the Bioeconomy. Invited speakers also stressed the need of turning the funding in research and knowledge generated into marketable innovations. An area in which European research has been lagging behind.

In the afternoon, a technology transfer dialogue between EU projects and tech-transfer experts took place in which representatives of FP7 EU research projects presented their transfer experiences of ongoing or finished projects.

PlantLIBRA delegate Alejandro Rodarte from Hylobates Consulting (Rome), a SME that serves as project management for the project coordinated by Prof. Restani of the University of Milan, gave a brief overview of the project. He also explained one of the project’s main outcomes: the ePlantLIBRA metadatabase, which is an unique and comprehensive online resource on plant food supplement and botanical data for researchers, health professionals, health educators, the food industry and policy makers. Furthermore, to improve the technology transfer to key stakeholders, PlantLIBRA partners are performing usability tests with end users to validate and improve the fit-for-purpose character and stakeholder usability of the ePlantLIBRA.

Among comments of the invited tech transfer experts, they agreed that with the increasing mass of knowledge being generated, agri-food and biological databases that can adapt to the technical advances, are sustainable, and that comprise existing databases, are vital for supporting the high demands of modern day research and application by stakeholders to support the European bioeconomy.

Like this:

“Knowing the benefits, but also the adverse effects of dietary supplements is very important, explained PlantLIBRA project coordinator Prof Patrizia Restani last August 16th as she presented PlantLIBRA in the 14th International Congress of Internal Medicine, a major event in this specialty, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and organized by PlantLIBRA partner Hospital and Clinics “José de San Martín” of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). “The idea is not to cause alarm in the population, but to study plant food supplements and communicate if there are potential drug interactions or risk factors to the people who use them”, she added during her presentation. An additional problem was also posed by Prof. Dr. Roberto Iermoli, director of Teaching and Research Hospital and Clinics at UBA, who said that it is common for patients not to mention or deny to their doctor that they consume these products. “When completing the medical history, the doctor has to ask if the patient is using any substance, and the patient should report if they are taking any dietary supplement.” Moreover, in Argentina, only half of the ten dietary supplements of plant origin most consumed would have few reliable studies to convince a good family doctor, wrote Fabiola Czubaj reporting on the conference for the online presence of the newspaper La Nación.

Dr. Raul Pastor, Head of the Section Polyphenols, Wine and Health of the department of internal medicine of the UBA who studies the cardiovascular risks and benefits of supplements and explained the studies on benefits studied by health area by WP2 partners. He stressed as well the importance of effective communication and believes that the project is critical to improve the reference information for regulating the production, manufacturing, and marketing of dietary supplements based on botanicals. “The current situation is critical, with products that are offered and sold through informal channels such as the internet, with misleading advertisements and even toxic content” he continued.

Product quality is also key. So, experts agreed that not even grapefruit juice should be underestimated. “No plant is the problem, but the content of the product and the person has risk factors,” summed up Prof Restani.

The new 4 year project BRAMA- Botanicals Risk Assessment training in the Mediterranean Area, meet last Friday 21st of July in the center of Rome to have their kick-off meeting. The project composed of four organizations from Mediterranean countries will promote the mobility and exchanges of knowledge in the field of plant food supplements (PFS) through the training and professionalism of young people.

The project is a Cross-Border Cooperation (CBC) within the European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI) Mediterranean Sea Basin Joint Operational Programme.Project manager Dr Luca Bucchini of Hylobates Consulting Sr in Rome, Italy, welcomed partners and ENPI CBC MED officers, and emphasized the core goal of BRAMA which is to build up the competences and professional skills of young researchers, technicians and inspectors in the field of botanicals.

Partners had the chance to present their institution, their experience in the botanical field, and their role in the project. Partners had the chance to present their institution, their experience in the botanical field, and their role in the project. Hylobates Consulting Srl in Rome, Italy, will be conducting the project management and developing the courses and training in quality control and safety assessment of botanicals for both technicians of SME’s and inspectors of regulating authorities. Dr Hanem M. Awad of the National Research Centre (NRC) of Egypt, will be training two selected PhD students on state-of-the-art and novel methods in risk assessment practice of compounds with toxicological activity that can be present in botanicals. Within its modern technical and analytical laboratory facilities, Jordan partner Alà Al-Subeihi of Aqaba International Laboratories – BEN HAYYAN will train students in applied research for developing physiologically based kinetic (PBK) models for bioactivation and detoxification of selected substances found in PFS. Added to this Mediterranean mix, Prof Anastassios Troganis, University of Ioannina in Greece, brings analytical chemistry research in the project for the comprehensive phytochemical analysis of botanicals, the chemical structure elucidation of compounds of interest, and the development of methods using NMR spectroscopy.

Besides of training PhD students, BRAMA will train young technicians in quality assurance and safety assessment of botanicals for industry, particularly seeing to the needs of Small and Medium Enterprises. The young professional counterpart are the inspectors and competent authority staff that will also be trained within modules specifically designed and structured

In addition, ENPI CBC MED officers explained the ENPI programme structure and objectives, and guided the BRAMA partners with their questions of the financial aspects and rules for the effective implementation of the project.

In the last day of the meeting, project associate Dr Jacques Vervoort of Wagenigen University (NL), remarked that “we need to improve the capacities of young people. That is what BRAMA is about” as he explained the needs for the specialized PhD training courses to be prepared by the partners.

“The project BRAMA is implemented under the ENPI CBC Mediterranean Sea Basin Programme (www.enpicbcmed.eu), and is financed, for an amount of 1,53 million Euro, by the European Union through the European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument.

“The 2007-2013 ENPI CBC Mediterranean Sea Basin Programme is a multilateral Cross-Border Cooperation initiative funded by the European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI). The Programme objective is to promote the sustainable and harmonious cooperation process at the Mediterranean Basin level by dealing with the common challenges and enhancing its endogenous potential. It finances cooperation projects as a contribution to the economic, social, environmental and cultural development of the Mediterranean region. The following 14 countries participate in the Programme: Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Malta, Palestinian Authority, Portugal, Spain, Syria, Tunisia. The Joint Managing Authority (JMA) is the Autonomous Region of Sardinia (Italy). Official Programme languages are Arabic, English and French.”

A new database of information on food ingredients will help clarify the fuzzy boundary between food supplements and herbal medicines across Europe” is the headline of a recent post of the Europe Research Media Center. In this article, Institute of Food Research(UK) scientist Paul FINGLAS explains the value of the database being developed and how it will pool together the existing knowledge on the beneficial and adverse effects of bioactive compounds in supplements. The database is one of the EU fundedPlantLIBRA project’s main outcomes and it will define a consistent set of references for bioactive ingredients for all member states, where presently the categorisation between plant food supplements and traditional herbal medicinal products varies between countries. This is particularly important for imported plant food supplements that need harmonized regulation to improve quality and consumer safety.

In this sense, PlantLIBRA is taking an appropriately broad strategy in analysing all relevant aspects of the research needs for the science and regulation of botanicals, such as intake and consumption patterns, supplement composition and analysis, and the evaluation of benefits and risks. Hylobates is one of the project partners currently working on the risk-benefit assessment of plant food supplements for an improved science-based decision making approach.